Newbie here

[toomumsy]

Hi, I've just been told I'm prediabetic and have high cholesterol. So just starting on this journey looking at my diet and trying to get my head around a few things. I see there is a lot of chat about carbohydrates, something for me to look into. I've been given the Glucose Revolution book, which is an interesting read but not sure how following it impacts my high cholesterol, more researching required I guess. I've been referred to NHS, its a 10 week waitlist, so any guidance to get me started would be greatly appreciated, I'm a slow and steady kinda person. Thanks

 

[Inka]

Welcome @toomumsy 🙂 Yes, it’s carbs that you’ll need to watch. A good starting place is to write down an average day’s food for you pre-diagnosis and then identify places that you can reduce carbs. Fill the space with green veg and possibly more protein.

Also, increasing your exercise will help a lot. You don’t need to go to the gym. Walking regularly and briskly is a great way to exercise.

 

[ianf0ster]

Hi @toomumsy and welcome to the forum.

While I don't want to confuse you, especially since you are only prediabetic, outside of the mainstream media and public policies there has been a lively debate about cholesterol and fats for over 50 years. While probably all you have heard is that: A. Eating Fat makes you fat. B. Eating Fat increases LDL cholesterol , C. LDL Cholesterol causes clogged arteries and heart attacks.

While I appreciate that it's near impossible to prove a negative i.e. that animal mainly saturated fats don't harm us, consider the following:

1. Ancel Keys implicated saturated fat for causing heart disease which was still relatively rare at that time when a US president in his 50's had a heart attack. To do that he selected 7 countries (from over 20 for which he had data). The 7 selected appeared to show a strong correlation, but taking all of them combined there was absolutely no correlation.

2. It is now known that smoking is a major cause of heart attacks and that President was a chain smoker. As was my Dad who died of a heart attack at the age of 45 in 1966 - it was not his first, probably his 3rd the others just being thought to be bad indigestion.

3. Despite a campaign for low fat, heart attacks didn't change much leading to many more cardiac doctors being trained in the UK. Then smoking was banned in public indoors - and heart attacks suddenly dropped! Incidentally At the conference held to decide upon the first US Dietary guidelines (to combat heart attacks and obesity) half the scientists said that eating sugar should be discouraged and the other half that eating animal fats should be discouraged. Since it was a stalemate and it was not possible to advise both, an assistant to the US Politician chairing the conference made the decision to choose to limit animal fats. This directly led to margarines and trans fatty acids being introduced into our diet.

4. In this forum we know that eating saturated fat helps us reduce our weight just as eating carbohydrates tends to increase our weight. Yet sat fat is still blamed for making people fat. It also helps control T2 diabetes (since it doesn't raise Blood Glucose levels) which itself is a major cause to heart attacks. So how is it causing more heart attacks while reducing a major cause of them?

5. Many medical studies, plus the figures from Dr David Unwin's GP Practice patients show that on a Low Carb (higher fat) diet his patients have (on average) much better HDL figures, much better Triglyceride figure and even lower LDL figures. So even if one believes that high LDL is automatically 'bad' (which I don't) How is it that saturated fat can ''lower' that LDL and yet it is still blamed for raising it in the first place?

6. Lastly, the observation that the majority of heart attacks happen to patients with 'normal' LDL (nearly 75%) rather than those with 'high' LDL. In fact almost half occurred in patients with 'optimal' LDL .This from a study done by UCLA hospital and published back in 12/1/2009.

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

Hi, I've just been told I'm prediabetic and have high cholesterol. So just starting on this journey looking at my diet and trying to get my head around a few things. I see there is a lot of chat about carbohydrates, something for me to look into. I've been given the Glucose Revolution book, which is an interesting read but not sure how following it impacts my high cholesterol, more researching required I guess. I've been referred to NHS, its a 10 week waitlist, so any guidance to get me started would be greatly appreciated, I'm a slow and steady kinda person. Thanks

Welcome to the forum @toomumsy

Slow and steady is a great approach for diabetes management - so it looks like you are set up for success already!

Sorry to hear about your elevated cholesterol. The vast majority of expert opinion and clinical research suggests that elevated cholesterol is something you’d want to address. There are a variety of options for doing so, including reducing saturated fat intake (which has been shown to increase LDL in many studies and trials). Many forum members find that a moderate or low carbohydrate way of eating also seems to help improve their cholesterol splits. Food intake can only go so far, because quite a lot of cholesterol in our bloodstream is made by the body, so it may be that you are recommended a statin to bring your total cholesterol and splits back into the recommended ranges. I was slightly hesitant about taking a statin for a few years, but started on one a year or two back and have had no ill effects whatsoever, and now all parts of my cholesterol splits sit within the suggested values.

We have had lots of newcomers arrive over the years having been told that they are at increased risk of diabetes (sometimes referred to as prediabetes), who have been able to successfully steer away from a diagnosis by making a few tweaks to their menu. Mostly this involves moderating or reducing their total carbohydrate intake (not just ‘of which sugars’), making some swaps, changes and portion-size reductions. As soon as you start noticing carbohydrates it’s amazing how skewed towards that food group the modern western diet seems to be. And a little rebalancing with protein and good fats, plus more leafy veg can be a very powerful strategy 🙂

 

[toomumsy]

Hi @toomumsy and welcome to the forum.

While I don't want to confuse you, especially since you are only prediabetic, outside of the mainstream media and public policies there has been a lively debate about cholesterol and fats for over 50 years. While probably all you have heard is that: A. Eating Fat makes you fat. B. Eating Fat increases LDL cholesterol , C. LDL Cholesterol causes clogged arteries and heart attacks.

While I appreciate that it's near impossible to prove a negative i.e. that animal mainly saturated fats don't harm us, consider the following:

1. Ancel Keys implicated saturated fat for causing heart disease which was still relatively rare at that time when a US president in his 50's had a heart attack. To do that he selected 7 countries (from over 20 for which he had data). The 7 selected appeared to show a strong correlation, but taking all of them combined there was absolutely no correlation.

2. It is now known that smoking is a major cause of heart attacks and that President was a chain smoker. As was my Dad who died of a heart attack at the age of 45 in 1966 - it was not his first, probably his 3rd the others just being thought to be bad indigestion.

3. Despite a campaign for low fat, heart attacks didn't change much leading to many more cardiac doctors being trained in the UK. Then smoking was banned in public indoors - and heart attacks suddenly dropped! Incidentally At the conference held to decide upon the first US Dietary guidelines (to combat heart attacks and obesity) half the scientists said that eating sugar should be discouraged and the other half that eating animal fats should be discouraged. Since it was a stalemate and it was not possible to advise both, an assistant to the US Politician chairing the conference made the decision to choose to limit animal fats. This directly led to margarines and trans fatty acids being introduced into our diet.

4. In this forum we know that eating saturated fat helps us reduce our weight just as eating carbohydrates tends to increase our weight. Yet sat fat is still blamed for making people fat. It also helps control T2 diabetes (since it doesn't raise Blood Glucose levels) which itself is a major cause to heart attacks. So how is it causing more heart attacks while reducing a major cause of them?

5. Many medical studies, plus the figures from Dr David Unwin's GP Practice patients show that on a Low Carb (higher fat) diet his patients have (on average) much better HDL figures, much better Triglyceride figure and even lower LDL figures. So even if one believes that high LDL is automatically 'bad' (which I don't) How is it that saturated fat can ''lower' that LDL and yet it is still blamed for raising it in the first place?

6. Lastly, the observation that the majority of heart attacks happen to patients with 'normal' LDL (nearly 75%) rather than those with 'high' LDL. In fact almost half occurred in patients with 'optimal' LDL .This from a study done by UCLA hospital and published back in 12/1/2009.

Thanks for the comprehensive response, I've had to read it a few times and probably will read a few more times. So, I think what you are saying is reducing fats in diet isn't necessary the only answer, which I agree with having struggled to lose weight over the years trying various diet programs which only produce short term results. Again, thanks for taking the time to welcome me and share this information.

 

[toomumsy]

Welcome to the forum @toomumsy

Slow and steady is a great approach for diabetes management - so it looks like you are set up for success already!

Sorry to hear about your elevated cholesterol. The vast majority of expert opinion and clinical research suggests that elevated cholesterol is something you’d want to address. There are a variety of options for doing so, including reducing saturated fat intake (which has been shown to increase LDL in many studies and trials). Many forum members find that a moderate or low carbohydrate way of eating also seems to help improve their cholesterol splits. Food intake can only go so far, because quite a lot of cholesterol in our bloodstream is made by the body, so it may be that you are recommended a statin to bring your total cholesterol and splits back into the recommended ranges. I was slightly hesitant about taking a statin for a few years, but started on one a year or two back and have had no ill effects whatsoever, and now all parts of my cholesterol splits sit within the suggested values.

We have had lots of newcomers arrive over the years having been told that they are at increased risk of diabetes (sometimes referred to as prediabetes), who have been able to successfully steer away from a diagnosis by making a few tweaks to their menu. Mostly this involves moderating or reducing their total carbohydrate intake (not just ‘of which sugars’), making some swaps, changes and portion-size reductions. As soon as you start noticing carbohydrates it’s amazing how skewed towards that food group the modern western diet seems to be. And a little rebalancing with protein and good fats, plus more leafy veg can be a very powerful strategy 🙂

Morning, thanks for your welcome and for sharing this information. Yes, reading the packaging has been very enlightening. Glad to hear you got your cholesterol down. I'll discuss the statin option with my Dr at my next check up. Thanks again